UBC faces human rights complaint in wake of sex assaults

A former UBC graduate student is taking the school to BC’s human rights tribunal of the school’s failure to act in a string of alleged sexual assaults and harassment cases.

Glynnis Kirchmeier, a graduate of the History department, says she made a complaint against another student in 2014 which the school never acted on.

“UBC’s chance to do the right thing is over. Clearly they have zero interest in the safety of women. The university is going to be tried in the court of public opinion, then it will be tried by the BC Human Rights Tribunal, and I suspect it will be tried in civil court as well”

Former grad of history dept Glennis Kirkmeyer launching a complaint against UBC at BC Human Rights Tribunal. pic.twitter.com/lSsVAob3aX

Kirchmeier says her case will focus on the University’s handling of multiple sexual assault incidents over the past 20 years.

Botched cases

Kirchmeier was joined by several students and staff at a press conference today, slamming the school for it’s failure to act in cases of sexual assault.

Caitlyn Cunningham, another former History graduate student, says she reported a sexual assault last July — but that it took the school more than 18 months to act on her complaint.

“What I found was that campus administrators tasked numerous students with time consuming, unclear non-academic misconduct that honestly went nowhere until the release of the CBC Fifth Estate documentary”

Cunningham says she never took her complaint to police, because she was assured the school would take action.

“Had i sat in a room with them in July of 2014 and they suggested that filing a police report may be the best course of action and then they would support me as I do that, then maybe I would have. But instead I was promised they would handle it. And I trusted them.”

“We do have to let due process unfold as it will. I understand due process can be frustrating and lengthy at times, but we are required to follow the process.”

That message was echoed in a statement yesterday from interim UBC president Martha Piper, apologizing to the victims.

I want to apologize to the women in these cases who feel they have been let down by our university. While the university had to wait until it had the necessary facts to take action, I acknowledge that the process took too long. Due process can be frustrating and time-consuming. However, the university reached an appropriate conclusion. As an institution, we are committed to justice for the survivors of sexual assault.

The school’s student advocate says sexual assault is “absolutely a problem” on campus, and is calling on the school to create a sexual assault response team, similar to those present at other universities.

That’s a good question. I don’t have a university degree, but I’m smart enough to do an Internet search. Typed “UBC RCMP” into Google, and found this:

Royal Canadian Mounted Police
2990 Wesbrook Mall
(604) 224-1322

Now, if these women did contact the RCMP and were forsaken and forced to go to UBC Campus Security, then we’ve got something interesting here. Otherwise, what reason(s) would they have not to contact police directly?

I do recall a certain false accusation of rape case against a certain lacrosse team…

I believe the University is required by law to report all these incidences to the Police. If they failed to do so then they should be held accountable and whoever made the decisions should be charged. If the police have investigated and found nothing to proceed with then what else can the University do. CKNW needs to find out if the alleged offenses were properly reported and if not why and by whom.

“That’s a choice for the survivor. How they want to report, who they want to report to and when they want to report. We would be providing them with the information and education around those various options, but it is the choice of the survivor, how they want to proceed.”